


Any More than Fate

by SandrC



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, No Dialogue, No em dashes for funsies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-06-26
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:47:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24925639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SandrC/pseuds/SandrC
Summary: Or: four ways they could have met Saccharina.Living in a candy jailWith peppermint barsPeanut-brittle bunk bedsAnd marshmallow wallsWhere the guards are graciousAnd the grounds are grandAnd the warden really listensAnd he understands
Relationships: Saccharina Frostwhip & The Rocks Family
Comments: 14
Kudos: 49





	Any More than Fate

**Author's Note:**

> I started this Wednesday and it is done. I started Twice Befell a month ago and I'm still writing. What is my brain but a grist mill for Emily Axford's characters?
> 
> Saccharina is great and I can't wait to see more of her. So much of her front is performative but underneath even that is a person who wants to do good and has the means to do so. Anyone who says differently can meet me in the fucking pit. I've seen y'all on tumblr and I will kill y'all. DNI, fuckos. I'm not even playing.
> 
> Anyway, anger aside, title and summary from Candy Jail by the Silver Jews. Felt like a mood.
> 
> Special shoutout to Jack, who churns out CroC fics so fast. What the fuck dude? I'm impressed haha.

It goes like this:

Catherine Ghee heads back to Candia with a child in tow. The little girl is a minty soft serve, her dress a serviceable brown with a white frock, her neapolitan hair in a short bob. The two of them are stopped at the gate and Catherine stares up at the Tartguard and demands, with a voice as clear as a buoy in a storm, to see King Amethar. They let her in. Within the day, her marriage is annulled, Sir Theobald as a witness, and disappears into the night, her daughter left behind with her father and his wife and her half-sisters.

Caramelinda doesn't treat Saccharina any different from her own two daughters and the three Rocks sisters grow up to be hellions. They run from lessons in hidden passageways. They torment Theo and Lapin and Calroy with their hijinks. They explore the woods near the castle with their cousin Liam, watching the native wildlife of Candia do as it will.

Saccharina grows up with a mother who loves her, even if she isn't her actual mother. She grows up with two sisters who would kill for her and die for her in equal amounts. She grows up with a father who lavishes her with affection to the point of drowning. She grows up with the history of Lazuli mere passages away, even as she recounts her dreams of her aunt to Theo, who weeps openly at the memory. She grows up surrounded by people who care and teach her to rein in the storm in her veins and reign over all of Candia.

She owns a pair of well-worn magic daggers that belonged to her Aunt Sapphria, Jet and Ruby having Aunt Rococa's rapier and Aunt Lazuli's bow respectively. She isn't alone. She never will be.

It goes like this:

A group of stragglers is brought to her court by Gooey and Jon Bon, Swifty having darted ahead to tell her of the Primogen and his ex-royal compatriots. She greets them with aplomb, tipping her hand early and smiling as nobles would, demure and kind. She is rightfully Queen, is she not?

Out of all of them, the one that struggles the least against her ideals is the Primogen. A dour chocolate rabbit, he listens to her plan about the frozen temple and laughs, sharp and rapid notes of hysteria. Until then he had been quiet, content to listen to the Lord Commander and her father and Lazuli's wife and Prince Wilhelmina and her half-sister bicker back and forth about the situation they were in. But the mention of the Sugar Plum Fairy is enough to send him into a fit.

She presses him and he sneers. His hands flicker with magic and she can taste the sugar in it and she understands him. Understands his laughter. Understands the bitter cacao that lies beneath the sweetened surface. She waves her hand and the frigidity of her magic cools the sugar into crystals that dust the floor like snow. He speaks unkindly about the Church and she matches that with her own cool admissions. He speaks sharply of the Sugar Plum Fairy and she returns with a nod and her study of Lazuli's research. The two of them find some camaraderie in their shared states.

Even if the others don't trust her, the Primogen does, both against the Church and for Candia. They're both Candians above all, and that's what matters.

It goes like this:

Saccharina's heart is racing as she prepares to meet her family for the first time. She takes a deep breath, magic coalescing beneath her fingers, and exhales frost and storm. She smiles wide and greets them with laughter and forced nonchalance.

Her father is in shock, Lazuli's wife equally aghast, though her face reads anger more than confusion. A resignation of sorts. This may as well happen. Beside them, the tall monk of the Spinning Star looks at and through her, his eyes tracing the move of her magic, placid. Behind him, the Lord Commander keeps his paw on the pommel of his blade as a warning.

Prince Wilhelmina and her half-sisters whisper back and forth in a lyrical language that tugs at her chest. It's a connection, something he has with them she does not. The ugly feeling of jealousy and frustration swirls in her and she inhales, holds, and exhales a cold cloud of magic like she's practiced. The flickering puff of whipped cream dissipates before anyone notices save the monk, who eyes her with more care than before.

As she gives them her titles and her names, their talking stops and they focus their full attention on her. It stops her heart in her chest but she inhales, holds, exhales. Her father's eyes trace her up and down to see her mother and his own in her form. Her half-sisters watch her with mirroring eyes, black and red and unblinking curiosity, before they confer with each other again in the language they share. As her father tosses the crown at her feet with a bitter statement, she can't help but feel a little cheated.

She has to let go of childish delusions. Not every meeting is perfect.

Her half-sisters pull her aside after the initial meeting, grabbing her hand during the feast and dragging her away from Gooey and the others, who she placates with a nod. They press her for any information they can, both political and personal. With tongues as fast as the blades they pull from hidden places, the twin daughters of Amethar and Caramelinda interrogate Saccharina for all she contains and she allows them in.

When everything is said and done, distrust wiped from their faces, they confer in their shared language and Saccharina lets the hurt bubble forth to the surface for a moment. With her throat choked with sorrow, she thanks them for caring this much. She lets them know she appreciates their candor.

Even if they don't accept her, they don't hate her, and that's the best she can ask for right now.

It goes like this:

Her marauders bring in her father and Lazuli's wife and the Lord Commander and a monk of the Spinning Star and Prince Wilhelmina and one of her half-sisters. Dark and angry, the remaining Rocks sister lashes out with blade and word at anyone who gets close. Saccharina doesn't blame her much, though she doesn't know if the difference between losing a sister to battle or losing a mother to fear is small enough to warrant saying she understands. Instead she takes her half-sister off to the side and lets her attack away until she collapses into a sobbing mess on the floor.

Even if she isn't that girl any more, Saccharina understands and lets her half-sister work it out. Lets her cry until her voice stops working. Lets her blade strike against her armor again and again and again without retaliation. Lets her scream indignities against the Bulb and the world and magic. Lets her mourn in a violent and angry way that she may have suppressed when she was with her family.

Saccharina pulls her mask away, comforted she doesn't need to be someone sweet for her, and reassures her in the way that she reassures herself. It won't get better, you won't forget, but you can do something with it. She teaches her the secret of her mask and smiles soft and sweet. Saccharine.

They enter the dining hall hand-in-hand, masks on, and plan for the oncoming fight. Her half-sister willing to abdicate the crown to her, her willing to take the burden with little ceremony.

It goes like this:


End file.
